Village Hidden in the Dead
by giraffe.out.loud
Summary: Shortly after Pain's defeat, a recovering Konoha is taken over by a horrendous zombie outbreak. As friends run and enemies fall, will Naruto and company solve this mystery? Will they find a cure and stop the infection? Or will Naruto end up among the Walking Dead?
1. Prologue: A Tribute to the Dead

"Hey, man."

Kakashi stands at the marble platform, hands pocketed, eyes dropped. There's not much to say today. Having coming here every morning, conversations tend to run dry. They age as children do, as books on a dusty shelf, wine in a forgotten cellar. He rethinks his silence. He wonders if it's even necessary to say anything at all.

He finds a good topic.

"You should've seen Naruto save the village. You should've seen him stop the mighty Pain."

Obito laughs. Or at least, Kakashi thinks he does. The dead have no voice, none the living can hear. They have no eyes, no hair, no touch, nothing with which to perceive earthly messages. Kakashi knows this but it's comforting this moment to think that they do.

He finishes his morning ritual and walks away.

Kakashi had always wondered how life would have been if his dear friend were still alive. Would he still wear those silly goggles? Would he and Rin have ended up together? Sometimes he envisions the two sitting at a bar, sharing beers together, laughing about Gai's latest antics and Minato's winded speeches. Kakashi's father had always told him stories of the second Hokage, of how he was able to resurrect the dead for purposes of battle. "What if," Kakashi wonders. "What if I learned it and brought back..."

He immediately discards the thought. Rin, bless her soul, would hate for Kakashi to tamper with the natural order. The seasons exist with purpose, he tells himself. The dead need rest just as the living need sleep.

He continues on his way and retrieves a book from his side pouch, a book entitled _Icha Icha Tactics_. It is an adult novel written by a former mentor, a great man now passed. Since Pain's attack a few months back, Kakashi has had little time to enjoy the book. It was an amazing read thus far, as scandalous and riveting as its previous installments. He considered rushing through the pages but has opted for the slow path, to really savor the text. This was probably the series' final volume, too, with its author now gone. His thoughts turn grim again. If only Jiraiya, if only its writer were still...

Again, Kakashi stops. Not from his gloom but from the sight of two suspicious figures: teens. One male, one female. They are twenty meters out, running hands on each other, surrounded in a grove of irises and geraniums. Kakashi shakes his head. They're making out, he realizes, at seven a.m. in the morning.

Incredible.

He steps closer. The young lady is a feisty one, tearing at the young boy's shirt as kunai would through paper. The boy is submissive; his head is buried in the woman's frizzled hair. For a moment Kakashi watches, conflicted between the pleasures of his book and of those standing before his eyes. He had read a passage like this in _Icha Icha Paradise_, of two characters running dirty deeds under a waterfall but he never believed it could actually happen. He feels compelled to watch but cannot help but feel burdened by his responsibility as an adult. Perhaps, they're too young to be doing this. What if she gets pregnant? What if he breaks her heart? Damn guilt, he says.

He resolves to end the antics.

Kakashi calls out then stops. He sees the girl bleeding. Profusely. Both of them are bleeding—the girl from her mouth, the boy from his neck. Kakashi acts quickly. He shoots a warning kunai past them. But they continue. At that instance, Kakashi realizes the weight of the moment. This isn't just a friendly rendezvous. They're not making love—_she is eating him alive_.

"Stop that, you're killing him!" Kakashi shouts.

The girl slowly turns to him. She stares down the Copycat Ninja with empty eyes, windows devoid of youthful warmness. Her mouth opens to reply, but all that escapes are bits of red grime and skin. She groans and staggers to get a better look. Kakashi pushes past the a flower bushel and readies his stance. The entranced girl hisses, then drops the young man. She lunges at Kakashi, who slowly pulls the metal plate away from his left eye.

"I guess Chapter 10's gonna have to wait."


	2. 28 Hours Earlier

_Yesterday morning. _

"You don't like raw meat?"

Choji's voice echoed from the bowl which hid his entire face. Naruto had been poking at his wagyu beef for some time now and Choji was starting to worry.

"Nah. I do," Naruto muttered. Choji dropped his bowl and continued an ongoing theory on fried dumplings. He believed dumplings to symbolize enduring friendships, being delicate and flimsy on the outside but warm and tender within. He nodded, agreeing with himself and the satisfaction of having struck an idea of which Shikamaru had never thought. Naruto tuned him out. The clanking of pots and chop sticks against porcelain drowned out all syllables of the connoisseur's rant.

_Clink. Clank. Clank._

Choji motioned towards the chef, a pinched smile between his balloon-like cheeks.

"One more please."

The chef nodded.

"Sure thing. And you Naruto?"

Naruto shook his head. The chef disappeared into the back and returned with another bowl, filled to the brim with his trademark broth.

_Clink. Clank. Clank._

"Thanks," Choji said.

He turned back to Naruto whose chopsticks had now found their way to a burnt strip of pork.

_Clink. Clank. Clank._

"What's the matter, man?"

No response.

"Lady Tsunade giving you problems? Kakashi running you on dumb missions?"

Nothing.

"Is it a girl?"

Naruto winced. _Clink, clink, CLANK._

He adjusted his seat. His right thigh had gone numb without his noticing.

"I guess you could say that," Naruto said.

"What happened?" Choji asked. He slurped a healthy portion of broth, halfway through his new bowl already.

Naruto laid his chopsticks down. He had not wished to talk about it, let alone over a delicious bowl of ramen, but the atmosphere was creeping in on him. Choji was too friendly of a guy to keep secrets from and the room was loud enough so that even the most skilled Sound Ninja couldn't eavesdrop on them.

Maybe talking about it would help, he thought.

"I got," Naruto began. He stopped, then composed himself. "I got into a...Sakura is mad at me."

Choji ceased mid-chew.

"Oh man. Is everything okay?"

Naruto fidgeted again.

"No. I tried to tell her to...calm her down. She's been working really hard as of late. Ever since Granny Tsunade got sick, Sakura's been covering some of her lectures and…doing okay with it, I guess."

"Good for her." Choji's face was buried bowl-deep again. "Wait, isn't that hard?"

Naruto shook his head.

"Well, not for her. And normally, I'd be proud but she hasn't been taking care of herself. No sleep, food, rest, nothing. Two weeks straight!"

"That's bad."

"Yeah. She's delivering a speech tomorrow on some 'new cellular-regrowth-something.' I told her to take it easy and she…she yelled at me."

Naruto's frown flashed into a grimace. His hand had suddenly balled into a fist.

Choji took a moment to grasp the situation. He knew Sakura to be a self-absorbed overachiever but he also knew food to be a necessary component of one's life. The two simply didn't mix in extreme portions. And Naruto's frustration seemed justified, though a little melodramatic. His crush on her obviously escalated matters.

"What did you do then," Choji asked. His bowl was empty, traces of pepper and residue left in the center.

"I fought...I guess I argued with her. Told her that she shouldn't do that. Then she called me insensitive. Said I didn't know how big of a deal this upcoming demonstration was to her and she need to work hard at it."

Naruto could hear her words over the clamor of the shop. Sakura wasn't particularly angry at him—she had said so herself. But she didn't like being told what to do either. It was the type of girl she was. Unfortunately, Naruto was the type to let her words sting him as such. After their exchange, she walked away, back to her books, back to Lady Tsunade's study, and Naruto knew not to chase.

The chef, who had been listening the entire time, dropped in.

"Don't let a girl bring you down, Naruto-kun. Sometimes women are like boiling cups of tea," he said. "You gotta let 'em cool down before you sip 'em."

His chuckle boomed throughout restaurant. A waitress, who had been passing through the kitchen, elbowed the old chef in the gut. He winced then motioned a smile towards Naruto.

"See?"

But Naruto was lost in his thoughts again.

Choji called for the check.

* * *

They exited the noodle shop and walked along the brazen dust path. The weather was hot, abnormally hot for this time of spring. Early cherry blossoms wrinkled under the heat, sprouting clusters of dying petals. The populace reacted as well. Tank tops, floral parasols, sandals—summer fashion for a late March day.

As such, a crowd had gathered about the _Hot-Hot-Yogurt_ stand and the vendors rushed to accommodate all orders. Choji followed suit and joined the ranks of the audience. He browsed through the storefront menus briskly but stopped after realizing he had left Naruto behind. The jumpsuited hero was twenty paces back. He seemed to trudge through his steps like a fox whose leg had been crushed by a clamp trap. Choji receded and waited for him.

"You know, you could do something nice for her." Choji said.

Naruto lifted his chin, attentive.

"Whenever Ino's angry at me, I just give her a cup of vanilla pudding. Cheers her up golden. Well, she stops yelling at me, at least." Choji glanced between the vendors and his friend. He needed to finish his point soon before the line got too long. "Get her a present or something. Girls like presents. I think."

Naruto paused. He remembered stories of Ero-Sennin and how the old man would write Tsunade poems on occasion. Of course, the bulk of his writing was sleazy and amorous and sometimes way too convoluted. Yet, once every blue moon, the old man would weave a magical stanza that somehow made her blush (according to Jiraiya's own words).

The idea wasn't too outrageous. It had been a while since Naruto had done something nice for Sakura. Lee had told him the promise to bring back Sasuke was a fantastic gift, one worthy of a true warrior. But the mission had failed abysmally. No Sasuke, no good news. Nothing to bring back home but empty hands.

This was all a stark contrast to the moments Sakura had stuck her neck out for Naruto: their first lunch together, survival training with Team 7, the Forest of Death fiasco, and visits during countless recoveries. He recalled the hug Sakura had given him after defeating Pain. The slight scent of flowers amidst burning debris. The holes in his hand, forgotten. He could feel her fingers wrap around the back of his neck and rest softly there. She had only uttered a "thank you," yet it had brightened his entire day, as if embracing a star and not burning with it. He wondered if the crowd was cheering for Pain's defeat or simply for the two of them.

Naruto decided: he would get Sakura a gift and, hopefully, she would forgive his insolence. He need only figure out what "that gift" would be. He turned to thank Choji but found no one.

"Choji?"

Choji had probably run back to the ice cream shop, he thought. Naruto's smile returned.

"That guy, I swear he could eat a person's weight in food."


	3. The Rising Dead

"We need to evacuate the village."

Kakashi's vest was pungent, stained with crimson and moisture fresh from the morning's fiasco. He had run past the outer chamber guards just as he had the inner chamber ones. They had let him through; no one dares question the legendary fighter, especially when he is covered in red. The blood's origins do not matter—it is typically _never his_.

But the veteran soldier was struggling for breath and the stares were not friendly. ANBU agents laid on the outskirts of the room, hands on their blades, tracing Kakashi with their eyes. The Copycat himself was not above suspicion. Assassins come in all shapes and forms, even those of friends.

Homura, who had been informed of Kakashi's approach, met the gasping ninja in the center of the forum. "What is the meaning of this? Why are you covered in blood?" Homura shouted.

Kakashi heaved slowly, finding the right words. The image was difficult to translate into sound. He began simply. "We're under attack."

The ANBU loosened their stances. Danzo, whose eyes were fixated on Kakashi's bloodied vest, snickered. "And by what exactly?"

Kakashi gulped. He had said nothing and yet the explanation sounded even more ludicrous with each passing thought. "I was in the training grounds this morning when I came upon two youths. Male and a female. They…the girl…she was…" Kakashi stopped.

"What?" Chairman Mitokado asked.

Kakashi mustered his senses. "She was _eating the young man alive_."

"Eating him alive?"

Kakashi nodded. "Yes. As if she were possessed by a demonic cannibal. She was feral. Violent. She tried to do the same to me."His audience fell silent. One ANBU guard started to laugh, but his chuckle fell beneath the air of the room. The Copycat Ninja is known for stoicism, not humor.

Mitokado shook his head. "You are sure of this? That this was no genjutsu?"

"I am sure, chairman. But that is not all. There is more." Danzo's smirk had disappeared behind a glare. "I succeeded in subduing the young girl. After tying her up, I checked on the young man. He was dead. Pulse: zero. Chakra flow: diminished. And yet…moments layer, he rose. He rose from his dead state and attacked just like the girl."

Chairwoman Utatane's mouth dropped. Mitokado eyes channeled confusion then fear. Danzo's face curled further into anger.

"What do you mean he _rose_ from his state?" Mitokado asked.

"As in…the young man tried to kill me. Tried to bite me as the young girl had."

Blank stares met Kakashi just as he predicted. He was ready for this moment, however. He shifted the band from his left eye and addressed Mitokado. The ANBU reached for their blades again. "If you allow me, chairman, to show you directly…" His irises spiraled into red blades. A Genjutsu demonstration.

"What the hell is your problem!" Danzo began but was interrupted by Utatane.

"Let him," the chairwoman said.

Mitokado stared into the eyes of Kakashi as the scenery around them slipped into streams of pigment. The drapery stretched and whirled until they dispersed into bits of greenery and stone. The carpet gave out, slipping beneath a floor of grass blades and dirt. The two of them now stood in the center of the training grounds, surrounded on all sides by bushels and tree trunks. Mitokado saw the two victims, the ones accounted for by Kakashi. The girl lie writhing on the floor, wrapped in a bundle of thin white twine. She hissed and gurgled as she spat a tepid mixture of yellow and red onto the soil. The boy, no more than thirteen, stumbled under his own legs. His neck was torn apart, skin peeled back in some places, eviscerated to the muscle. The two were both drenched in red.

Mitokado watched in horror as the young boy staggered towards Kakashi. His hands were outreached. Eyes wide but blind to reason. Kakashi sidestepped out of the monster's path. Dazed for but a moment, the feral child continued his chase, falling over and over again. Mitokado looked back to the girl on the floor. She had wriggled several feet from her original position and like the boy, her eyes were fixated on the Copycat Ninja.

Hungry eyes. Cold eyes. Disturbing eyes.

Eventually, the bushels clumped together, the grasses withered into stone, and the zombies faded into seats. Mitokado was standing in the council room once more, gazes fixed upon him. Kakashi's eye had reverted to black and the forehead protector slipped back into place. He turned to Utatane who turned to Danzo and then back.

"What happened?" Danzo asked.

Mitokado struggled to utter the words. He shook his head and turned to Kakashi. "What did you do to them?" His tone had flat-lined.

Kakashi crossed his shoulders. "I brought them to Medical via Reverse Summoning. I would have transported them both personally but…I didn't have a muzzle on hand. I don't know exactly what's going on, but it appears to be an infection of some sort. One that transmits very quickly and through blood. We need to make necessary precautions. Or else…" Kakashi silenced himself. It wasn't necessary to finish.

The councilmen exchanged quick frowns. They have seen Konoha falter to terrorists, to the Kyuubi, to Pain, to Itachi, but nothing of these terms. Nothing of cannibalism and children eating one another.

Mitokado spoke first. "Have medic teams on standby. Dispatch perimeter units to densely populated regions with orders to detain threats on site. Kill if necessary." Kakashi began an argument but found no stance. Mitokado continued. "Cease all business and school activities. From this moment on the village is on high alert. Women and children are to be evacuated to city outskirts while able bodies…fight."

Mitokado stopped to think. The image of women fighting their husbands, kids fighting their best friends filled his vision as did Kakashi's nightmarish genjutsu.

Danzo continued. "I want those two children studied immediately. We need to understand how this sickness works. And…" Kakashi turned his attention to Danzo, who contemplated his words. "…never mind. That is all."

Ninjas dispersed left and right, some by doors, most by windows. The ANBU within Kakashi's periphery had already disappeared leaving no traces but dirt speckles from their boots. The councilmen themselves continued deliberation. As Kakashi walked away, he caught glimpse of Danzo's gaze. It was a glare of hatred, of blood-thirst, and madness. Kakashi knew the eyes well for the monsters themselves had worn them so easily. "What are you not telling us, you Jackal…?"

Never mind him, Kakashi told himself. There were more pressing matters at hand.

He headed for the door, thoughts set now to his ragtag Team Seven—the boy in the orange jumpsuit wearing a loud smile; the lady with pink hair, speaking with pride and intelligence. "I hope they're both safe," he thought.

And then he was gone.


	4. Wake of the Living

_5 minutes later._

She had it all planned out.

She would study for three weeks straight. Start with the hardest material first then work her way down. Draft several outlines (because you can never be too sure), then outline the drafts. She would practice her delivery in front of stuffed animals because those stuffed animals would represent the bright young faces of Tsunade's first year medical students. Tokka was the monkey—Tsunade's troublemaking freshman. The giraffe was Shiki—a prized but overzealous young bookworm. "Don't let them take control of the class," Tsunade reminded her. "They have a way of getting out of control."

She had the whole morning planned out.

She would have breakfast with Ino at seven, deliver mom's flower baskets at eight. Rest then cram some more till ten. Arrive half an hour early: fifteen minutes to setup, three minutes for the bathroom, thirteen as a buffer. In those minutes, review the outlines and the drafts, replacing any words that didn't fit or terms which were too complicated for first years. It's not a bad thing to have _extra _time. _Just-in-case _time, yes.

She had the entire lecture planned out.

She would look up, never down. Speak clearly, without arrogance. Motion confidently, keep her shoulders back. Introduce herself boldly. "Hello, my name is Sakura Haruno and I'll be stepping in for Lady Tsunade today." Meet the audience's eyes, smile, and bow. She would start her lesson with a well-constructed anecdote about bacteria, how, like ninjas, they both take and give life on unwritten discretion. She would flawlessly transition into her thesis about reconstructing scar tissue, _dead skin_ cells that have healed improperly. She would cite her references, explain the findings, then replicate—to a lesser extent—the experiment of skin repair on reptilian skin shedding. She would succeed, they would clap, and the lecture would be over. She would thank Lady Tsunade for all her research notes and the world would be at peace. It would have been a brilliant plan.

But fifteen minutes into her demonstration, the windows shattered and those plans would have to change.

* * *

He couldn't have been more than eighteen years old. A good looking kid with messy auburn hair, lapis earring on his left ear. The charm dangled against what appeared to be a shard of glass that had lodged itself in his temple. He was bleeding fast and hard. Wounds like those are fatal—no science lesson necessary to know that much. But he appeared to not care. He sluggishly climbed through the window, tracking bits of wood and crystalline onto the concrete floor. The teen slipped over the sill and fell on his face emitting an odd _squish _sound. Everyone watched, awe-struck.

Sakura stepped forward.

"Oh my God. Are you…are you okay?" she asked.

The medical students picked the young man up off the ground. Shiki repeated Sakura's question. But the kid did not answer. He simply moaned, his hands fumbling in air through the arms and pleas around him. He reached, pushed and reached and pushed, throwing concerned hands off him. And _growled_. Then, without warning: _clamp. _In a flash, the young man's mouth clasped onto Shiki's hand_._ Blood trickled down her knuckles and the entire classroom burst into screams.

Tokka lunged towards the boy. "Get the hell off her! What the fuck is wrong with _you_!"

He grabbed the lapis boy's neck but his grip would not cease. He was still biting her and pulling Shiki, shaking his head and spurting splashes of red into the air. Shiki was yelling now, shrill notes that pierced Sakura's hearing.

"Get him off me! Oh my God, get him off me! Please!"

Tokka pulled and pulled until finally the lapis boy gave way, the two crashing off the podium. Shiki crumpled to the floor a small crowd of girls swarmed her. Sakura rushed to Shiki and examined her hand. The boy had ripped a huge chunk of her pollicis out, revealing torrents of blood and ripped thumb skin.

"Shiki Are you okay?"

Shiki returned a blank stare. Her face had paled and her entire body was shaking violently. She was going into shock.

More screams echoed the podium. Sakura turned around to find the lapis boy now biting into Tokka's wrist. Tokka yelled as he struck the boy in the head with his free arm, jabbing and hooking every part marker of his face stained by blood. Others joined in the beating but as with before, the boy did not relent. He was still biting. Still biting, still growling, still biting. Sakura reverted her attention back to Shiki who was slowly keeling over to her right side.

She's fainting already? What the hell?

"Get me a towel!" Sakura yelled at one on the students.

She had to act fast. She could surgically mend the wound with chakra but the bleeding would need to be controlled first. Shiki's breathing was increasing rapidly. Her pulse was getting more unstable. She didn't have much time until Shiki would pass out and possibly—no. Not today. Not like this, not my first lesson.

The student who had retrieved the towel was already applying pressure to Shiki's hand. Sakura turned back at the madness. Tokka, who was holding his own wrist, was now kicking the deranged boy in the gut. Three other boys joined in. The shard of glass in the lapis boy's head had broken off but his side still continued to leak crimson, a faucet broken and colored.

"Stop it! Just subdue him! Don't kill him!" They ignored Sakura and continued their beatdown. Sakura motioned towards one of the girls beside her. "Do you know basic regen jutsus?" Sakura asked. The young girl nodded nervously. "Good. Then do it."

The young girl took her place and Sakura approached the four young men who were still punishing the rabid child. She grabbed one of them by the shirt collar and threw him against the wall, fifteen feet back near the entrance. She pushed the other young man to the side, so forcefully that he flipped over several rows seats. The last one ran away. Sakura then glared at Tokka who quickly backed as well.

Sakura stood in the center of the room, looking down at the lapis boy whose violent growl had toned into a weak gurgle. She grabbed him by his rugged hair, keeping the rest of her body away from his mouth. His eyes were pale. White as if inflicted with sight-ending cataracts, as if he had died a week ago. Months even. His jaws continued to clamp, biting into air as blood curdled from the corner of his lips.

For a brief moment, Sakura could hear screams echoing from down the hall.

"Who are you? What the hell is wrong with you?" she asked the lapis boy.

The lapis boy responded with more animal-like growls. He reached for her neck but Sakura jerked his neck to the side.

"Answer me!" Sakura raised her fist to strike but stopped. She heard her name.

"Instructor Haruno! Instructor, please come quick!"

Sakura turned to the corner where Shiki was being treated. Shiki was seated in the position just as Sakura had left her but the girls had spaced themselves ten feet now. Shiki's head was raised but her eyes were glazed over; the hands that were once shaking in terror were now extended out, reaching for the girls that had spent the past minute nurturing them.

"Oh God," Sakura thought. "Oh God, no…"

* * *

_Huff-huff-huff-huff-huff._

Sakura remembered the time she studied basic hospital emergency codes. The alignments were simple enough. Red codes meant fire, yellow codes meant equipment failure and blue code represented patients in critical condition, often those going into cardiac arrest. Shizune told her those were the only ones Sakura really needed to know because the colorful others "the code greens, the code oranges" rarely occurred. "Just crazy scenarios to finish the crayon box of emergencies," she would say. Especially Code Gray, the unarmed assailant alert. After all, who would be silly enough to attack a hospital run by ninjas? Unarmed especially?

Who knew.

_Huff-huff-huff-huff-huff._

"Hurry the fuck up!"

Sakura turned the corner, routing another deranged runner in the process. This one looked like a lab technician, a young one. His surgical mask was hanging off his neck, lodged in a nasty wound right about his left collarbone. She punched him and he flew off, just as the others did before him. She could hit. She knew that. She could tag them so hard that their insides would explode and leave nothing but bits of dust and red; and for her, a slight ache around her wrist. She could break their bones against her knuckles and end their miseries like a boulder against skull. But she held back, the way she often would when hitting Naruto. She couldn't kill fellow ninja. Not like this. Not even now.

She had left the classroom with about seven students, seven grown teenagers who screamed like children but ran like old men. Their numbers dwindled to five, one disappearing into a lab, and another against a wave of more panicked students. All around the halls, screams and racing footsteps banked the corridors of the building. She kept running, not from fear but on a motherly instinct, a drive to protect the students that were with her. They could _fight_, she knew they _could fight_. But they _weren't and therefore she would have to pick up the slack._

She turned back once more. One, two…four? The students ran past her, one crashing into her shoulder. Three stopped to wait but Sakura yelled at them. "Keep going!" They were close to the exit now and they would at least be _safer _there then trapped here in this god-forsaken labyrinth.

Sakura ran back looking for the one that was missing. She was sure it was a girl, a short girl with long black hair and a pretty face. Before the incident, the girl was sitting at her desk, taking notes scrupulously. She was nice, studious. She reminded Sakura of herself during medical her own years at the medical school.

Sakura checked the past junction at the end of the hall. Left? Right? Left or right? The shrill screams were still resounding and it was difficult to decide over the cries which direction to venture down.

She stepped right but something in her periphery stopped her. A weeping figure. A girl sitting on the floor, head buried in her hands. There was a crumpled body on the ground next to her, lying face down in a puddle of blood and glass. A kunai protruded from the back of its head, torn about as if an image had been scribbled into his scalp. There was struggle and the girl had technically won. _Technically._

Sakura reached for the girl but hesitated. She had not noticed it earlier but the young lady was holding the top of her shoulder; she was wounded. Sakura carefully grabbed the girl's wrist. The young lady whimpered softly and Sakura pulled back. Calm down, Sakura, calm down. She tried once more. This time, she softly clasped the girl's wrist between her thumb and index finger then pulled her hand away slowly. Her purple t-shirt gave way, pulling strands of blood and strained skin. Teeth marks, ripped muscle—she had been bitten just like Tokka and Shiki.

If the scientific theory had taught Sakura anything, it was that patterns exist everywhere, even within the outlying circumstances. She could pray for everything to be okay, that she could bandage the wound and the girl would be smiling and pretty again, taking quizzes and exams and going to lecture five minutes late and not care. But she knew: this girl would go rabid in a few moments and spread its plague like bacteria in a culture.

Sakura could feel her hands go warm with chakra. This punch could end it, she thought.

But the girl shook her head, her lovely hair smearing the blood from her shoulders across her back. "I don't wanna die. I don't wanna die. Please don't let me die." She was crying, whimpering deeper into her blood-drenched hands. Sakura released her fist and reached for the lady's back.

"Come on, we're getting out of here."

_Huff-huff-huff._

Sakura ran through the halls, the girl's weight supported on Sakura's shoulders. The girl was surprisingly heavy, compounded by the difficulty that she simply wasn't running. Her legs caught ground every few paces, jittering Sakura's grip.

The halls were bare, save for a few bodies that lie static on corners. Sakura was racing fast, the light from the windows measuring speeds she had not known she was capable of.

_Huff-huff-huff._

As she raced past the auditorium, she saw one of _them,_ a rabid monster kneeled over a prone man's body, pushing his face into the man's abdomen. His guts lay next to him, tubes of pink and entrail gleaming under the fluorescent lighting. _It was eating him, _she thought. Treating his insides like morsels from a soup. Sakura felt her the back of her throat burn with vomit. She held her stomach in.

Not now, I don't have the time to do that now.

They were a few yards from the door when the girl with black hair went limp.

Sakura slowed her step until both she and the young girl came to a step. She laid the young lady on her side and ran two fingers down her neck. Her pulse was gone. Breathing: the same.

Not. Good.

Sakura took off her gloves and gathered some chakra into her right hand. It was a trick Tsunade showed her, one which Shizune said was too barbaric.

"It's not a defibrillator but it'll have to do."

She began counting in twos, pressing hard against the girl's chest then continuing every second or so. "One-two, one-two….please don't give up on me."

"One-two, one-two..."

After ten jolts, Sakura checked for pulse again, this time her ear against the girl's heart.

Silence.

Then _thump_.

Then a _bump_.

_Thump-thump. Thump_.

Her heart was beating again! Slowly, but most definitely it was there. Sakura smiled and pulled her hair back. The rise and fall of her chest was returning, each rise pronouncing a stronger fall and with each fall a more voluminous rise. She had done it, brought her back from the _dead. _Sakura surveyed the area. The vicinity was clear; celebrating was an option but likely not a good one. They had to keep moving. Sakura closed her eyes and counted the thumps in her wrist. "Forty….fifty bpm….good enough."

The girl's eyelids shook open, almost attentive, negotiating the light balance like a camera's aperture. Sakura eagerly waited for her senses to return. To congratulate her for holding on, for bearing with the injury, and for warding off a monster that had tried to kill her. But all Sakura met were empty irises and a hiss that only the most venomous snakes made. She looked up at Sakura—her pupils were fully dilated, wide enough for a pen to sink into it. Sakura could see herself in the dark reflection, spherized by black and a warp that bulged her own eyes.

Sakura wanted to sit there and cry but by the time her tears formed, her legs had already carried her outside.


	5. Bury Us Alive

He stood, frozen in step by the bath house, hands locked in a jutsu that refused to fire. He had resolved to rally survivors somewhere safe, not by decree but on impulse, by a moral code he likened to call his "way of ninja." He was confident in his ability to fight, to spawn twenty versions of himself, to fend off the twenty that stood before him now. But _here he was and __there, there __they stood, twenty figures before him now, each indistinguishable from __the one he had met earlier, a red-haired jonin that had offered him help and failed miserably._

And though they all looked the same—same hair, same clothes, same evergreen vest—something was hideously unfamiliar.

"Those eyes…"

Konohamaru pulled at Naruto's shirt. "What to do we do!" he cried. It was the only phrase Naruto could muster:

"Run."

The twenty Undead closed their distance. They were unbelievably fast, like foxes scurrying from a bush and onto its unsuspecting prey. They snarled and growled as they ran, scratching at the air aimlessly. Naruto grabbed Konohamaru by the forearm and quickly turned the corner of the bathhouse.

"Shit, shit, shit!"

Naruto hopped the twelve foot wall barring the back courtyard from the mountainside. Using three Shadow Clones, Naruto vaulted Konohamaru over and soon after dissipated his jutsu. His second clone had almost been grabbed.

The two boys landed just short of the hot spring's rim, pushing the fog beneath their feet out to the sides. Smoke trailed up Naruto's sides and into his nostrils. It was pungent, far more salty than the lithium and other minerals this bath house was renowned for adding. He sniffed again—he knew that smell.

Blood.

Behind him, Naruto could hear the heavy pounds of fist against fence, of blunt limbs crashing in wood. The clamor was staggered, disturbing, like a panel of books falling from a shelf and cracking their bindings. He heard hisses. Not from the coal in the boiler room but from _whatever_ stood on the other side. Konohamaru ran from the wall to the central faucets, choking on heavy sobs and air.

The wall could hold _them, __those things—but for how long? _And were they smart enough to simply _walk around_ through the front entrance___?_

The shaking of the wall was becoming unbearable. Naruto pushed off and stepped onto the hot spring, slipping a sliver of stabilizing chakra between his slipper and the water. The surface rippled with his step and it was then he noticed of glimmer of soft pink in the waves. At the base of the pool, he spotted soft clouds of red rising to the surface. He made out the shadow of a figure—the body of an old man, exposed from head to foot. A bath would've been nice, he thought.

Would _have been_.

Naruto turned to Konohamaru who was still crying to himself. God, not another disaster…and things were looking up, too.

The two had originally planned on peeping the ladies' baths from the roof of the building. "Training," Naruto insisted. But as soon as they arrived, the patrons were already fleeing—both clothed _and not._

One of the runners was a middle aged woman. Her bra had been ripped and her entire leg was bleeding, leaving a rich splatter behind her. Another, a middle aged man—his entire neck was covered in blood that wouldn't stop gushing. But that didn't stop him from running past the two young men.

Naruto ran with the mob but soon after, twenty or so of _Them_ came from the village path and ambushed the group with which he had been escaping. One of the jonins beside him created several Shadow Clones and told Naruto that he didn't need to risk his life save the village again. He fended the Runners off for a while until he was eventually taken down. There were just too many.

"Where do we go, Naruto-san! What do we do…"

"Shh!" Naruto yelled. He felt the air pressure drop around them. "We need to hide or get away from here."

A soft rattle echoed from inside the bath house. It rose in volume to a soft pound until the crescendo reached a mighty _BOOM. _The doors broke open revealing a woman wearing nothing but slippers and a soft blue showercap. Her left ribs were exposed, blood dripping off white bone into what looked like an exposed _gut_. She was heaving breaths, exhales that pushed the steam of the springs outward from her mouth. Her eyes were vacuous, the rim lined by a violent and stringed red. Behind her, the stamping continued_._

"Fuck."

Naruto gathered chakra into both hands and released a shadow clone. "Just strong enough to…"

He plunged a pulse of swirling air into the woman's abdomen. The skin by her ribs pulled and stretched against the wind until it splattered into the spring fog air. She flew from the yard through the bath house walls, pushing her and the red-haired jonins into the front patio.

"Too much…" he thought.

A scream from beside him.

He turned to Konohamaru who pointed into the shadows of the alley. Five figures emerged from corner, rushing through the darkness, flickering snarls of madness under the gaping lights. The ones from the other side! Five turned into seven, seven turned into ten, then ten turned into fifteen. All bloodied, all angry, all growling, all….mad.

Naruto formed his seal and—POOF!—split into five versions of himself, his native body still clinging to Konohamaru. This would not be a fight, he told himself. With Konohamaru here, this _can't be a fight._

He sent Beta Naruto around the West side, running through the alley opposite of the incoming swarm—three followed. Gamma and Delta Naruto ran through the wreckage of the bath house, tracking what appeared to be ten more.

But the remaining two Runners continued their rage towards Naruto and Konohamaru, closing into arms length distance. Epsilon Naruto leaned back and swiftly kicked one in the face, and then the other. The two figures stumbled into the nearby pool, scattering water onto the cobblestone path. Naruto was momentary blinded by speckles of water. Konohamaru watched as the two Creatures re-emerged from the surface, clawing at the air by their feet. The one closest to him vomited streams of pink fluid onto his own shirt.

Konohamaru felt a tug on his arm.

"Konohamaru, let's go!"

With a boost from Epsilon, Naruto and Konohamaru leapt onto the roof, landing just beneath the spine of the pagoda. Naruto turned back. Epsilon Naruto was a safe distance now, scouting ahead towards the West Konoha districts. But the Creatures were climbing out of the pool, screaming at the rooftop climbers with watered gargles. Naruto and Konohamaru didn't have much time before they would catch up somehow. They figured out the wall, Naruto reasoned.

They'll figure out the roof.

With a tug of Konohamaru's shoulder, the two continued running.

The plan wasn't complete but it was certainly enough to evaluate the current state of emergency. The former three Shadow Clones would divert runners away from the path, routing their numbers and thinning the ranks between themselves. Epsilon Naruto would act as an inner city scout, find survivors and save anyone who needed saving. Naruto wanted a fight…but first he would need to get Konohamaru to safety. Naruto considered spamming more Shadow Clones. He could control at least two hundred proficiently enough.

"But if one of my clones is hurt…what happens if _I turn just like that…"_

He left his thoughts there.

"Shit."

* * *

The walkways were cluttered with trampling, an ocean of stampedes and reverberated screams. It was difficult to tell who was sane and who was…not—they were all simply running and in madness appeared indistinguishable.

She could pick them apart one by one but the crowds made it difficult to line up accurate haymakers. A margin of error could mean the difference between striking a Deranged in the face and mauling a child.

God forbid one in the same.

Sakura remembered the words of an ANBU agent she had run into. "Evacuations are commencing. All healthy individuals are to report to the city borders and await further directions," the masked woman spoke. She had been slicing open several of the monsters at the time, her swings slower with each passing stroke. She was sturdy but Sakura could tell the blade was weathering a beating.

"What of the injured?" she asked.

The ANBU agent said nothing.

"What about the ones who are bit!".

Again, the agent said nothing.

Sakura escorted group of six—two adults and their four children. One of the girls appeared to be no more than five years old. Her mother cradled her as she ran, bumping her child's small chin against a seemingly massive shoulder. The three other kids—all boys—were crying uncontrollably. It wasn't until a few seconds of sprinting that Sakura realized a nasty gash on the little girl's leg. Teeth marks on her ankle.

Sakura thought about her own folks. They had left two days ago, away on the "vacation" they had begun to call their own "top secret mission." It would've been a hectic week, running mom's business, she thought but mother trusted her with the task and that trust was enough for her to take over the world. "We'll be back before you know it! And good luck on your presentation, love," her mother said as she headed through the door. She peered back in, grinning at Sakura one last time. "Oh, and one more thing: no boys aloud in your room."

Sakura turned her head back. The little girl was still clinging onto her mother's sleeves, her head buried into a cradle of black hair.

What should I do….

She could her Tsunade's voice reminding her of the doctor's code:

"It is a doctor's mission to heal the sick and weary. Moral preference aside, prejudices suppressed—the hurt are entitled to the rights of due medical care. This is what you must do. It is the answer and always will be."

She sought clarity in that moment. "But what if you can't heal them?" she asked earnestly. Tsunade's proud smile faded slowly into concern then slowly faded back. "What if they resist? What if they don't wanna be helped? What if they…actually try to hurt you?" Tsunade smiled. And answered simply.

"You do what you must."

Sakura suddenly felt her body become weightless. She watched as the sky sank into view while a sharp pain seethed through her forehead. Her teeth slammed together, numbness rushing from her eardrums through the back of her head and neck. She was falling backwards. She clamped her first and rolled quickly off her shoulders onto her knees. She looked up, her vision, blurred.

"It better not be one of you goddamn things..."

Sakura could make out only orange blobs. The figure she had likely collided into lie on its back, moaning pained wpes. It writhed, massaging the back of its head and turning over on its front. "Now's my chance," she thought, running towards the figure. She cocked her arm back to swing. The image gradually sharpened—flashes of yellow and purple blur merged into edges and angles of orange. Spiky blond hair. Orange and black jumpsuit. A familiar, foxlike face.

She rushed to stop but found herself skidding rapidly towards him. Naruto opened his arms and caught her by the shoulders.

She examined his face.

"Naruto!"

His frown spread into a smile. "Sakura-chan!"

"Holy crap! What are you doing here?"

"Running! Well, at least, I was…"

The stampedes were getting louder and it was difficult to speak over the screams.

Naruto's winced. A droplet of blood oozed from Sakura's forehead and formed into a clear, read droplet. "Are you okay?"

She touched her forehead and brushed the red between her fingers. "I'll be fine. But…"

Sakura looked around, back to the flanks of panicked citizens. So much…madness, she thought. The scene reminded her of an old, dirty kaleidoscope. Colors swirling in different places, patterns disrupted by new shapes and chipped hues. She saw people fleeing, people fighting. Bodies being opened with blades, teeth finding necks and dismantling skin from muscle and muscle from bone. They—_Them—they _were maniacal. Pulling and biting, ripping hair, or grabbing whatever was in reach. She wasn't sure but they appeared to be growing in number. How could this be, if the ANBU were killing so many? They _were_ killing them, _right__?_

Her eyes grew large.

"Were they self-replic—"

Naruto interrupted. "Come on, we're going to the bunkers!" he yelled. He grabbed her hand and pulled her into the direction of the ramen shop. They leapt onto the roof and ran across, feet clattering against the loosely installed shingles. Sakura oriented herself: they appeared to be running towards the Genin Academy, northwest from the nearest city border, northwest from where the ANBU guard had told her to run. She pulled back on his arm.

"Wait, shouldn't we be evacuating?"

"What!"

"Shouldn't we be evacuating? Where are we going?"

"The bunkers under the Hokage monument."

She clamped her fist—she was ready to swing. "What the fuck! Why are we doing that? Shouldn't we be leaving the city? We can't trap ourselves like that!"

Naruto looked into her eyes. She had made "that face." It was a look that under normal circumstances would have scared him; a visage that demanded fear and respect. But these weren't normal circumstances. And they weren't getting out of the village, either.

No one was.

* * *

The kaleidoscopic reception spun in five, two images on the side and one shifting center. He was tired in two fractals; panicked in the rest. He could see the images clear as diamonds, or as clearly as he had become accustomed to controlling more pairs of eyes. The Kage Bunshin demanded uncanny multitasking, and though he wasn't the most brilliant student, he was certainly quite good at managing three versions of himself.

Delta and Epsilon Naruto were still running, tracking over thirty Runners behind them—each. But they were a safe distance from the residential areas and he could dispel the Clones anytime. Gamma Naruto held Konohmaru, en route to the bankers which lay beneath the earth and rock. They were safe as well.

But Beta Naruto had a different perspective. He stood at the eastern city gates, staring into the dark slots of a golden ANBU mask. The golden ANBU mask stared back, saying nothing, as did the others behind him. They simply stood there, about twenty of them. Hands spread, darkness garbed, chanting the same mantra over and over and over in a senseless, beelike hum. A crimson heat emanated from their hands, bending the light in cluttered distortions of blue and purple.

It's a justu. A barrier jutsu.

We're being shut in.

Naruto pounded against the invisible surface. "Get the fuck out of the way! What the hell are you doing!" The countless others behind him shouted their protests in lieu, throwing rocks, dust, and shoes at the wall of light. But the hymnal procession continued, buzzing through the air as did the smoke packets.

Chills ran into his hand. Naruto looked down at his knuckles and found that the skin had nearly been burned off. The field was heated.

"We need to get out! My whole family needs to get out of here!" An old man pushed his way through the crowd and charged shoulder first into distorted space. Naruto could not stop him. He collided in the field and—_FWSHH—_his tunic burst into a flame. The old man rolled onto his back against the rocky trail beneath them. Naruto ran over and patted down the torch as fast as he could, trying his best to calm the old man down. The man's forearm drooped slightly. It was broken. Onlookers screamed. More dispersed. Others broke down where they stood_._

Naruto turned back to the cloaked figures. They continued to chant, mouths held static by golden embossments and black linings. Naruto could feel his hands burning up as swirls of energy rapidly entered his palms.

If only I had another Clone with me.

"You fuckers…"

Naruto stepped forward to punch the wall, but was stopped by a sudden movement in the ranks. One of the figures was walking towards him. The black figure stopped at the front line. He was taller than the rest, not by much. It was difficult to make out, but black bangs fell from the mask down into the back of the hood. He stared at the jumpsuited hero. Then spoke monotonously.

"By decree of the Feudal Lord, this village is hereby quarantined until further notice."

Naruto punched the wall once more, his eyes surging with blood.

"Fuck your Feudal Lord! These people need to flee! Get out of our way!"

But the black figure did not flinch. He stood, still staring at the young man.

"By decree of the Feudal Lord, this village is hereby quarantined."

Naruto had given up the argument.

"Until when!"

The villagers behind Naruto screamed. He turned to his back and saw them scattering, opening pockets to make way for an unseen wave. A crowd of _**Them**. Them. _Filing in and rushing towards their formation. He and the villagers were trapped. He yelled once more at the Golden-Faced Figures, shouting curses upon curses, seering his fingers on the impenetrable wall.

But the Golden Masks watched and said nothing.


	6. Beneath the Surface

The torches were spaced from one another. Every few steps, they descended further into the shadows. Sakura held her breath for each second they entered, as if plunging her head into a lake and not knowing if daylight would return. _Breathe_, she told herself. This is happening. This is _really_ happening. People are turning into monsters and attacking each other. Her classmates. Dead. It was no dream, no genjutsu but a reality painted in blood and screams.

The flames guided for seconds at a time, ebbing like waves, and pulsing only slightly faster than the steps of her tired feet.

She was told the underground tunnels had been here for as long as Konoha had been but a simple idea in great men's mind. The burrow was both a tactical thruway and a cunning safe route for the rapists, the killers, and the patriots of old times, sheltering all those who had committed crimes against a higher power and sought to be hidden from their smite.

And here they were—among its halls breathing its history. New footsteps in the stories of runaways.

She could hear the trapped sobs behind her, of children crying against their mothers, of grown raucous men brought to silence, and of her own friends who could do little to comfort her.

She asked herself. What did we do to deserve this? What the _**fuck**_ did we do to deserve this?

Naruto was silent. He could hear every inch of every echo in his step. His hands still stung from the burns. His mind was elsewhere. On the figures with the golden masks. Were they evil? Of course, they were. But to what capacity? Had they summoned those... creatures? To trap them while the city falls apart? Why subject the innocents of Konoha to such a fate? Was it genocide? Biological warfare? An attack from another Hidden Village? No. It couldn't be. None of it made any sense. With a forcefield that strong, they could have done **more** than box the city in.

His hands panged again and Naruto clenched his teeth. Some _hero_, I am, he thought.

His memory piqued once more.

He ran back images of the ANBU saving his hide. They redirected Naruto and Sakura through the north district, through alleyways and hidden corridors. The ice cream shop he had visited earlier was torn to pieces. Barricades were set up, covering doors and windows and whatever crevices remained exposed. It was wartime. The enemies were old allies and dead allies and it was a logic only forbidden jutsu could explain. Nagato. **Pain**. _Orochimaru_. Faces and powers that still made Naruto quiver.

Sakura peeked at Naruto's hand. His palms were scabbing. It was not unlike the time he had lost control whilst fighting Orochimaru and found himself in the anger of the Kyubi. She had healed him then but she could not heal Naruto now. That would require her to halt the caravan and that was not an option in evacuation protocol. It isn't much but...

She reached out for Naruto's shoulder, but stopped midway.

She felt eyes on her. And chakra slipping from her body.

They came across a passage where two ANBU were stationed along the path. One of them had his hand stretched out to those passing, an awkward wave of sorts. As the group proceeded, Sakura had felt a strange change of air around them, goosebumps running over her body. It reminded her once of a class in Tsunade's tutelage. The lesson was diagnostics and Tsunade was teaching Sakura how to extract tissue samples without invasive clamps.

"Chakra is a wonderful tool," she told Sakura, wiping her hand across Sakura's cheek. Sakura felt a chill. "One tissue sample can tell me a lot about your health and diet." Tsunade paused. "Like how you need more beta carotine. And you're skimping far too much on vegetables and nitrates." She looked more closely at her finger. "Oh, and you should probably eat more organic food."

_Organic_ food.

Konohamaru broke her train of thought. "What the heck was that guy's problem anyway?" Sakura kept to herself. She turned to Naruto who appeared to have figured it out himself.

Not _him, _Konohamaru_. Us._ He's looking for problems with _us…_

They continued walking. Sakura heard screams erupt from behind them. A woman's scream.

"No! No! Stop! Where are you taking her! Get off my baby! Stop!"

Sakura dropped her head. She had seen the speed of the infection. From contraction to…whatever the hell it did. It was fast. _Too fast_. Unbelievably quick for any disease she had ever studied. And to be confined in these spaces with one of them—it was a disastrous image.

Sakura saw Naruto's back fading into the distance, already on his way to confront the issue. She grabbed him by his arm and he turned to her. He was scowling. It was a face she had only seen a few times in their friendship, a gaze that made her both admire and fear him.

She pressed down harder onto Naruto's arm, so hard that her arm stung. If she had to break a finger, she would. If she had to cripple his legs, she would have to. This cave could handle a hurt Naruto but it sure as hell could not contain an angry one. It could not handle any more bloodshed.

"Please, no..." she pleaded.

Naruto shifted his sight to the ANBU agent again who ran his hands around the space of the child. The caravan had stopped behind them, eliciting lines of concerned gazes. Sakura tightened her grip on Naruto's arm. He looked at the crowd, at the child, at the heartbroken mother, and then at Sakura. Her eyes could level him more strongly than any punch from Rock Lee.

The echoes faded into the darkness, behind the glow of the torch. The ANBU slowly dropped his hand and bowed to the lady. "My fault. Please proceed."

Sakura sighed in relief. Naruto's scowl disappeared behind a concerned frown and then a forced smile.

"Looks like we dodged that one, huh?" Naruto blurted.

He moved to continue walking but felt a weight on his tails. Konohamaru was grabbing Naruto's shirt. The group behind them had caught up, looking intently, and whispering behind the veil of a torch.


	7. Dark Floors

The path led them into an open clearing, illuminated by a litany of torches, portable lanterns, and flame jutsus. The ceiling couldn't have been more than three meters high. Every few steps, a stalagmite rose from the ground, piercing the roof as if being the only pillars which kept everyone from being crushed.

Naruto and Sakura encountered them. Hundreds of them—_normal ones_, those still among the sane and thoughtful.

As Naruto approached, so did their glances. It was a mixed reception of both relief and fear.

"Is that Naruto?" several whispered.

"Yeah, I think that's him."

"It can't be."

"Why's he down here….?"

"He's come to save us!"

The group closed in on him. Children crashed into his thighs, some crying, some laughing. The adults were more reserved. Some even snickered and turned away.

"What's going on out there, Naruto?" a child asked.

"Will everything be okay?" another begged.

"Naruto, where's my mommy?!"

"Will you beat up the bad guys, Naruto-san?"

Naruto turned to Sakura, his face caught between a frown and a smile. Just one month ago, they came to him in thanks. Now they begged for salvation. How fickle gratitude is, Sakura thought.

She stood frozen, not really knowing what to do.

A figure in a bandanna emerged from the crowd and pushed everyone back. He wore a frustrated smirk and a tight blue sweater.

"Alright, alright, everyone calm down."

"Those shades…" Naruto started.

The banadanned man approached Naruto but faltered, having tripped over his own feet. He stumbled to the floor with a hollow tune of thuds. Naruto and Sakura cringed at the sight. The man regained his footing and realigned his crooked sunglasses.

It was Ebisu, Konohamaru's instructor.

"And you!" Ebisu stuck out his finger towards Konohamaru. "You're late!"

Konohamaru shuddered. Ebisu nudged through the crowd until he was standing within an arms' reach of Naruto. He outstretched his hand, accidentally knocking over several children in the process.

"Oy, oy, come on everyone. Give the kid some room."

Ebisu motioned to the crowd until they finally dispersed back to their original stations. Some of the kids ran quickly back to their parents, who smiled at Naruto softly and quietly chattered with their youth. Others reposed critical glances.

After the masses spread, Naruto attempted to approach Ebisu, but found his leg locked in place. He looked down and found a little girl with her head pressed into Naruto's gut. She refused to let go of Naruto's leg.

"Mila!" a voice in the crowd called out.

The little girl startlingly looked into the crowd then back at Naruto.

"You'll find my daddy, won't you? He was out buying me ice cream when the bad men all appeared."

Naruto turned to Sakura, who froze at first, then smiled. She nodded. Naruto passed the reassurance onwards.

"Of course we will. I promise." Naruto smiled and flashed a thumbs up. It wasn't a Rock Lee-caliber grin but it would have to do. Sakura held in a frown. She didn't like talk of promises and "nice-guy" poses, but exceptions could be made for children.

She knelt down beside the girl and cleared the mess of bangs from her eyes.

"Can you tell us anything about your daddy?"

Mila shuffled her feet and turned away. "Let's see. Umm, he likes dogs and birds and plays catch with me all the time!" Naruto grimaced. This was not a time to be cute, though its tenets were welcome in this dark crevice of a hideout.

Sakura chimed in.

"What Naruto meant to say was... what does your daddy look like? Do you remember what he was wearing?

She continued.

"Oh and he's big and scary looking but he has big soft brown hair and big green pants and really big boots and uh, a shirt with a big yellow eagle on it." Mila flapped her arms, mimicking the aviated design. Children speak better with their hands, Sakura remembered.

"A big yellow eagle?"

Mila nodded. "Mhm!"

Naruto knelt down beside Mila, nearly bumping Sakura over. Their thighs were touching and Sakura felt conflicted between punching Naruto and maintaining her composure in front of this distressed child.

"We'll definitely find your dad! Naruto reiterated.

The little girl ran back to her mom. The two waved goodbye and Naruto turned his attention back to Ebisu.

"Hey old man…"

His hearing found a screaming match. Ebisu was scolding Konohamaru and Konohamaru was in full defense. Or offense, if volume were a weapon.

"Young master! Where in the Hokage's name were you!? I was so sick and worried!"

Konohamaru interjected. "Jesus, Ebisu! You're not my mom!"

"That's not the point! You were supposed to be studying before, before… all THIS happened!"

"I was, damn it! But me and the Ninja Squad were on patrol!" He crossed his arms and lifted his chin in self-admiration.

Ebisu clutched the air."On patrol for what!?"

"Vandrels! That's how this all started? _They _started it!"

Naruto's eyes widened.

"Wait, what the hell are you talking about!?" Naruto jumped in. He and Ebisu were both grabbing at Konohamaru's vest.

Sakura reached in to pull Naruto back. "Guys…"

Naruto pulled away. "What do you mean _they_?"

Konohamaru regained his composure. "The scary guys!"

Naruto immediately recalled the figures in the Golden Masks. Konohamaru had seen them as well!

He shook the young child.

"Konohamaru! Tell me everything!"

Ebisu joined in. "Wait one second!"

Konohamaru's eyes raced to and from Ebisu and Naruto. His mouth was agape and blip of mucus stripped from his nose. He was visibly frightened.

Sakura raised her voice.

"Hey, guys."

Ebisu interrupted.

"No questions just yet! Naruto, I must ensure the safety of our young master as he has just experienced a life threatening ordeal. Now is not the time for an interro—"

Naruto ignored him.

"Konohamaru! Who did all this!? And how!?"

Sakura could take no more of this.

"GUYS!" Sakura boomed, jolting the three men. Her eyes scanned the room, escorting their glances to the crowd of concerned refugees—their unsuspecting audience. Many of them frowned, unsure what to make of the exchanges. Sakura knew the tension demanded reprieve and this talk would have to conclude someplace where little children were not crying.

"Can we please take this conversation somewhere else...?"

The three men nodded.

"Sorry about that."

Naruto dropped his head in remorse. A minor infraction against Sakura yielded a typical beating, an uppercut to the chin or a hammer fist to the cranium. A more unsettling argument, however, beckoned a silent storm. Sakura spoke well with her hands. Like a child.

Lke Mila.

"No more apologies today. It's okay… We're all a little… tense."

Naruto nodded. "Yeah…"

Their gazes met then quickly dispersed. Sakura averted concerned eyes and Naruto dropped his stare onto the ground. Ebisu and Konohamaru glanced between the two unsure of the awkward silence that had arisen between the two. There was an unseen electricity brewing and Konohamaru knew better than to meddle in what most people around him called to as "adult affairs."

Sometimes.

Konohamaru prodded Ebisu.

"Hey, what's going on?"

Ebisu realigned his frames. "I haven't the slightest idea."

Naruto had a habit of doing that, Sakura thought. Apologizing. Even after he had saved the damn village from Pain, from Gaara. He never stopped.

Apologizing. I never asked him to, she thought.

She clenched her fist and felt the blood pumping chakra through her fingers. But Naruto had said something stupid that day and she was recalling the scene in her mind's eye.

The images flashed suddenly.

A shredded exam. Food on the floor. A broken pencil. A falling sun. Shadows casted along the streets. An uncomfortable chill. Naruto stood in front of her, her tears welling up, clouding her sinuses and a better judgment. Leaves ruffling. She was fuming. She hadn't been this angry in a long, long time. And they had never fought like this before.

None of them saw it coming.

She saw his mouth move and faint echoes slipped past.

"Sakura… sorry... return... when… Tsunade… she…

His movements ghosted into black and orange blurs. He appeared a blob, an out of focus vision that animated with large movements and splatters.

She heard her own voice. She was speaking to him. Frustrated.

"This… believe… this… watch over… me…. anymore"

Naruto spoke again, this time his voice much clearer.

"I know but… times… you just… and know…"

She raised her hands in defiance, streaks of peach and her gloves fading into the bloom of the sun.

"I didn't… for you… this… never…."

His voice became startlingly clear then.

"If this is about Sasuke…"

She lost it. She could not control her voice any longer.

"This is not about Sasuke!" she yelled.

Sakura felt the ground under her feet once more. She was standing amongst Naruto, Konohamaru and Ebisu in the room. She had zoned out and a fog had welled in her eyes. Thoughts of _him _and fighting _over _him had that effect.

Naruto was talking to Ebisu. No. _Yelling_. The stern instructor had his arms crossed and shook his head to each of Naruto's arguments.

Another yelling match was ensuing.

"What do you mean I can't go up?!" Naruto screamed.

"With those things out there? It's suicide Naruto! We need you _here_."

"Doing what!"

"Being safe! You're the Jinchu…" Ebisu paused. Naruto's eyes had shrunk into a glare. He hated being reminded that he was both a monster and asset in the same sentence. Like a band-aid laced with acid.

The words echoed in Sakura's mind.

_Jinchuriki. Jinchuriki. Jinchuriki._

Ebisu fixed his posture and recomposed himself. "After all, you're… our village's savior."

Naruto retorted.

"Savior, my ass! What kind of savior sits on his hands and does nothing for his people!"

Ebisu shook his head again. His shades failed to hide the frustration in his eyes. "_**This **_is a different kind of battle, Naruto-kun! We're not just fighting those mysterious nin—we are fighting _**ourselves**_. The peaceful residents of Konoha!"

Naruto's furled eyes lost their intensity. The realization was finally kicking in. Ebisu continued.

"We are fighting against monsters who can turn us into their own and we have no idea how to quell this. Not without… violence."

The room fell silent and gazes roamed for answers. Ebisu's forehead was drenched from the humidity of the room and his bandana. He wiped his brow. Sakura turned to Naruto and felt his anger. His eyes fluxed between confusion and ferocity.

"Maybe so, but that doesn't mean we can't still help them. I'm going to do just _that_." Naruto turned and headed for the door, back into the main corridors. "And there's nothing you can do to stop me."

Sakura raised her hands in protest but nothing came out of her mouth. She was on the fence about what to do. Rescuing the stranded villagers risked exposing one's self to that hideous transformation. But staying in the caverns meant less efforts to control the collateral. It was a lose-lose scenario, all around.

Naruto opened the door but jumped back.

"Maybe not," a voice called out.

A man in a jounin vest walked in, escorted by two ANBU agents. It was Yamato, Team 7's new leader. "But I have to."

"But Yamato-san…!"

The ANBU agents tensed their muscles and gripped the hilts of their soon-to-be unsheathed blades. Their facelessness had always bothered Sakura, no matter how many times she had seen them guarding Tsunade's private quarters.

"But nothing, Naruto. We must keep you safe. By orders of Danzo and the head council. In the event that the village is completely overrun, we must ensure your safety and relocate you to a safer vantage point."

Naruto grit his fang.

"Fuck Danzo! Relocate?! You mean leave everyone here!?"

"If it becomes necessary…"

"It _**won't **_become necessary! We've got the Jounin, we've got Granny Tsunade, we've got an _army_. If you can give me one good reason why…"

"Naruto!" Yamato dropped his eyes. "The Hokage Residence… has been compromised."


	8. The Dead Pit

She hovered her hands around the crevasse, taking care not to latch onto the dying tissue. Strands of hair weaved artfully around each other, in zig-zigs, zipping closed what had once been a gaping ache of blood and puss. The braids of each suture scintillated the soft green grow of lightning bugs and the wispy hiss of cicadas.

"Don't worry, I'm clean. Tripped on the way into the shelter," he quipped.

She nodded and smiled at him, and continued the suture. The man's eyes were fixed on the spectacle, having never seen a knitting of this sort. He had never known of needles to fly. In fact, he had never known flight were possible. Few had heard of medical jutsu—even fewer had experienced it.

A long time ago, a great woman sought to change that.

"It helps if you don't look at it," she said, not looking at her nervous patient.

The young man jolted. "Sorry."

Naruto watched Sakura from a distance, admiring in quiet jealousy, wishing he had been the one on which she was operating. She had become even more skilled at suturing than he remembered. Naruto was prone to many injuries (most often Sakura-inflicted) and was accustomed to frequent medical treatment that he secretly enjoyed yet dared not tell her so. He loved watching her work and made a strong case to never get caught doing so.

He hadn't figured why.

The man winced suddenly.

"We're almost through. You're doing great," she reassured.

Her eyes were fixed deeply on the process, with the focus sharper and more intense than the finest kunai. But a familiar fatigue radiated from her eyes. He knew better than to speak, but he did so anyway.

"Hey, Sakura did you need me to grab you any-"

"I'm fine," Sakura interrupted, unflinching. Naruto's eyes fell to the floor.

Sakura not spoken of the Residence's fall but Naruto could tell it was still bothering her. Her movements were sharp and precise, but a storm brewed deep in her eyes. She wasn't operating as much as she was repeating all too familiar procedures.

At once the glow dissipated, and Sakura dressed the man's wound with a bandage.

"Thank you for your patience," she said with a bow. "You should be fine now. Just be sure to rest your arm for the next 2 days."

The young man winded his shoulder in big circular motion, and started at the wrapping before shooting a quick smile at Sakura.

"Wow, thanks for the help, pretty lady!"

Sakura blushed and turned away shyly. "Don't sweat it," she uttered, throwing tatters of unused bandage into a disposal bin.

The young man stood from his chair and approached the door. Before stepping through, he hesitated, then turned back.

"By the way," he began. "Where'd you learn a neat trick like that?"

She paused for a moment, then turned away. It was enough for Naruto to see her eyes well up.

"I had a good teacher."

Naruto thought about speaking once more, but thought failed his voice. He said the first thing that came to mind.

"Sakura, hey..."

"Could you leave me alone for just a bit...?" She did not raise her eyes to speak. Instead she rose from her seat and walked over to the sink. The stream ushered out the silence.

The young man stared wide-eyed at Naruto, and then at Sakura, then slowly tip-toed away. An echo trailed faintly into the room. "Damn. Was it something I said?" the young man bellowed.

As the steps faded away, Sakura calmly continued her work. And with that, Naruto left the room as he had sat in it.

Meager, and without a sound.

* * *

He walked through the onerous halls of the shelter, whispers and sobs bouncing around the rocky cones. He could hear the whimpers of young children and men alike. They came all at once and then not at all, in discomforting breaks. Steps. And then silence. Voices and then nothing.

He would have preferred something familiar. A rhythm. A laugh. Konohamaru's cursing. Something.

And then he remembered shouting, beneath shadows taller than mountains on a street that burned golden coral. It was humid that day, and he had opted to roll up his favorite orange jumper, jacket tied loosely about his waist. The children were running into their homes, called in for dinner by parents he had never known, for meals he had long missed with Jiraiya.

Why am I remembering _this_ now, he thought to himself.

Of all times to be thinking about _this_...?

He felt the oppressive summer heat of the day, saw the bright green trees of his favorite playground, colored an auburn hue by the falling sun. He watched his shadow in the distance, as it disappeared between corridors and convened again on the hazy yellow walls of towering food shops. His shadow seemed much larger than himself that evening, much smaller than the shadow walking beside him, beside the one of him that yelled.

He had said something wrong again.

"Why do you always insist on babying me?!" the shadow called.

His fists gorged with heat, then relaxed quickly.

"I'm not trying to baby you. I'm just..."

"Oh really?!" The figure crossed its arms, and with this gesture, its bright hair fell upon shaking shoulders.

"You can't ... my... this." the shadow called. Its words drowned in the echoes of the corridor. The figure appeared much larger and darker now, towering over him with a darkness deeper than anything he had felt from Gaara or Sasuke.

Or was it something else, he questioned.

No, it was sadness. But he hadn't realized it then, as he failed to realize many truths in their passing...

"You don't think I can take care of... Suddenly you're the only one who can..."

"No, it's not that... -chan. It's just that you're starting to worry..."

"And now you know how _it_ feels to be the worrying one... How it feels... on that end!"

The shadow stopped pacing and stood several meters away with its back to him. Its shoulders rocked with unease.

"...-chan..."

"...you think you're the only fighting, Naruto," the shadow started. It reared its head to him and revealed a stream of tears careening about swelled cheeks. In the sun, they appeared diamonds but to Naruto, each one fell with the sharpness of knives.

"You think you're the only one, but you're not."

"Oy, Naruto!"

Naruto's eyes shifted upward and returned to the halls before him. A distinct silhouette appeared before him, which became slowly illuminated by an ominous light below its chin.

"Ah! A ghost!' he shouted, bracing for the spirit's wrath.

His face slowly relaxed upon re-examining its characteristic headband and sunken eyes.

"You look troubled, child."

Naruto sighed. "Could you not do that, Yamato-sensei?"

Yamato smiled. "Someone had to."

The spritely figure shone the flashlight into Naruto's eyes, then clicked it off before he could react. Naruto tried to let out a smirk but before his lips could snarl into place, an arm dropped calmly onto his shoulder.

"When the great prankster Naruto starts frowning, you know the world's come to an end."

"So that's what happened."

Yamato crossed his arms and closed his eyes in contemplation.

"Yeah," Naruto agreed, staring as the flickering spark of the lone candle on the bench he had been sitting.

Yamato's eyes turned to Naruto once more. "And you said this happened at what time, again?"

"Around three? Four? It was the same time as..." he stopped himself, blushing at the thoughts of smooth bodies and forbidden curves.

"I'll overlook the fact that you were peeping in places forbidden to young gentlemen," Yamato spoke. "It does perplex me how... expedient this all seems. And the appearance of those nin in the golden masks..."

Naruto perked from his stupor. "Expeda-what?"

"Expedient," Yamato corrected. Yamato stood up from his chair and paced between the doorway and Naruto, looking up at the stone ceiling with no seeming shape or end. He was lost in his own thoughts.

"This makes no damn sense, but I'm positive those guys are—"

Naruto stared at the candles whipped to and fro, from a breeze Naruto could not see. His Naruto's thoughts raced again, from the events leading from the spa up to their escape underground. Yamato spoke to himself, as Naruto found himself thinking once more about the chaos of the day. About Sakura.

And those damn monsters.

Naruto perked up from his seat.

"Oh no! What about Granny Tsunade?"

Yamato expression went sullen. His eyes fell upon the wall and then to his hands.

"At 1300 and 20 hours the Hokage Residence, located within the heart of Konohagakure, had fallen under control of... those monstrosities."

"I know that already! But Granny Tsunade: is she okay? What happened to her!?"

"I don't know. These were the details that were disseminated to us by our scouts. The residence has fallen and presumably all those within it." He stopped to clarify himself. "We have not heard from Miss Tsunade either so..."

"Goddammit!" Naruto kicked the table, nearly knocking it over. "Aren't the ANBU supposed to be badass protectors or something?! How come they don't fucking know?! How come they couldn't protect Granny?!" Naruto snarled. "And why didn't that creepface Danzo let you guys talk about it!?"

Naruto gasped to catch both his mind and lungs. The candle whistled, unflinching in the bout of anger. Yamato knelt down to pick up a cup which has rolled off.

"Because he knows how rash you would have been about this. We need to remain calm in this ordeal. Otherwise, we'll succumb to their sickness as well, and that's the last thing we need."

Naruto thought briefly and lashed out once more. "Then we need to go up there and kick their deadbeat asses back into the ground! Those... zombie things!"

"Whose asses, Naruto?" Yamato spoke sternly. "The lives of your neighbors, classmates, friends, and teachers? Lest I remind you—you are not just fighting monsters. We are not fighting Orochomaru, or Akatsuki. These monsters are people." He hesitated on 'people.' "At least we pray they still are."

The sudden thought caught Naruto off-guard.

He recalled his training with Jiraiya and the importance of stillness in Sage-based jutsu. He could hear the echo of Jiraiya's words, half haunting, half-nagging, but certainly still loving.

"With peace comes answers," Jiraiya would start.

Naruto normalized his breathing.

And as Jiraiya would always finish: "So sit still and breathe, you jackass." Naruto smirked at the reminder.

"And so what do we do then?"

Yamato continued.

"We sit and wait it out."

Naruto raised his voice.

"That's your mega solution?"

Yamato shook his head. "No one said this could be solved easily, Naruto. It could prove difficult..."

"No one said it would be easy, sensei. What matters is that we get off our asses and do something."

"Naruto. Danzo has ordered a mass-cleansing of the village within the next 36 hours."

Naruto nearly choked. "Wait, what?"

Yamato struggled to finish his thought. A voice from the doorway finished it for him.

"They're going to kill every last one of them, aren't they?" the voice spoke. Sakura emerged from the shadow cast by the portal. Her eyes were glued to Yamato, unyielding. Angry.

He nodded unwillingly.

"As we speak, Danzo and several dignitaries of Konohagakure are communicating with the nation's allies to discuss an appropriate course of action. Not just Danzo, but most of the world I imagine sees us as a biological threat."

Sakura spoke. "That's why we've been quarantined, haven't we?"

"It would seem so." Yamato answered. "For our safety or our demise, we won't really know. And we _don't_ know either who those masked individuals are. But within the next day and a half, things could get pretty messy, and we'd best keep or wits about us."

Silence fell upon the room. Naruto and Sakura glanced into space and then upon each other. For a moment, their sadness met one another but a familiar spark ignited once more. Their eyes recalled the days of starving by tree stumps, of catching bells, of running from Kakashi-sensei. Their Team 7 days were finding them once more.

Sakura broke the silence.

"Then let me and Naruto find out."

Yamato bristled.

"What the hell—"

"Give us clearance to fix this."

Yamato's face flushed red.

"No, it's too dangerous out there. I can't allow the two of you to risk your lives—"

"But out _there_ are where the answers lie! Damn it, sensei, I can cure this fucking thing! Give me time." She pointed at Naruto. "Give _us _time."

Yamato composed his gaze once more. "You do not know this, Sakura. I respect your medical prowess and talent, but how do you know _this _is a problem that _can _be fixed!? How do we know this is a curable virus? How do we know this is not an advanced form of summoning jutsu?" he looked at the candle, which appeared to flicker more wildly than before.

Sakura jolted. "I don't know... but I can tell you that a summoning jutsu of this sophistication, couldn't possibly exist, nor could any ninja sustain this many entities all at once without dissipation!" Naruto's mind spun from the terms.

"I know a biological infection when I see one. I have scoured over half of Tsunade's medical journals and I believe _this _can be fixed. Any disease can be fixed. You just need to find the cure," she began, turning to Naruto. "Or you make it yourself."

Naruto smiled back.

"This is what Tsunade-sama taught me."

She glared at Yamato with a hatred to light the room afire. "I'll figure this out with or without your help."

She swung her shoulders in the direction of the doorway and left the room. She slammed the door in the process, shaking the room and its sparse furniture.

Naruto waited before speaking once more. "She's right. I need to go out there, Yamato-sensei. We need to do something about this."

Yamato sighed. "If you must. But do note this, that from the moment you leave this room. You and Miss Sakura will be watched, Naruto. We've got ANBU agents all over the facilities."

"So much that did for the village," Naruto mocked.

And with that, he left the room, but much quieter than his very angry friend.


	9. One Dark Night

They called him the "Human Calculator" a name which had frustrated him on its brash oversimplification. What he did in his own head was more complex than any mathematical keyboard than could fathom. More open-ended than complex looking algorithm. More intricate than any lesson plan the Jonins could ever hope to muster.

_Think! Fuck, fuck, fuck!_

He was a strategist.

_Closets. Dark__,__ dark closets. North, northwest, south by the ivory table. _

A thinker.

_12, 6, 22 meters respectively—_

An artist of his craft.

_North! Fuck. NO! South! _

Like a sculptor, he could mold clay into a masterpiece—

_How did they find us so quickly?!_

From palettes, to portraits—

_Got to be quick about this._

From many possibilities into one perfect answer—

_Run, Shikamaru! Run!_

But now he was knee-deep in a problem that was running out of solutions.

_CRASH._

He collided into the door shoulder first, unhinging the screws from its fixture. The door crashed onto itself and with it the young tactician. Shikamaru rolled off his back on onto his feet, quick enough to eye the two figures lumbering towards him.

"Oh no you don't!"

He clamped his hands together and traced a line from his eyes unto the their shadows. A twine of darkness shot from his foot and met with theirs. _Caught _as many other victims before his shadow.

He grinned and stood from his place.

But they did not stop moving. His Shadow Imitation was not working.

"What the—"

The rabid creature grabbed Shikamaru and thrust him onto the floor. Shikamaru fell against the limestone tile and for a moment, his cheeks went numb. His vision blurred as droplets of moisture and red sinew splattered on his face. He heard slobs and growls and perhaps it was conditioning or the many fights with Akamaru that he instinctually began kicking at the sky. He felt his feet connect against skin, along with that soft squish sound of a melon dropped.

_They're trying to eat me like they ate Kumi! These fuckers are really trying to eat me!_

Shikamaru's vision refocused on his former intern's face. Her teeth were bloodied and glimmering with a gnaw so gaping he could have thrown a flask straight through. She was digging her nails into Shikamaru's collarbone. He could feel the heat of her grunts on his nose and were her teeth any closer, he would certainly be breathing through another hole in his face.

"Get the FUCK OFF ME!"

He grabbed her by the collar and threw her to the side, sending her reeling into a shelf of mops and unused cleaning supplies. Shikamaru quickly turned to the other figure he had belted with his foot. It was a young man, his clumsy assistant Kaito now wearing a vacant, mulling expression, mouth agape and drooling. He struggled to his hands and knees. The kick had done its damage, broken the man's nose and nearly ripped a chunk of eyelid from his cheek. The chunk flapped from Kaito's face as he turned to find Shikamaru once more.

But Kaito showed no signs of fatigue. It was though the kick did nothing. Meant nothing. Hurt _nothing_.

Shikamaru rolled back onto his shoulder and vaulted over Kaito . He found himself back in the main Encryption Hall. It was an office laden with stacks and stacks of decipher notes but the papers all had been scoured from their neat piles into illegible clusters. He had solved messages more complex than Naruto's logic but _**this**_ was just outrageous.

Ink and blood tangled into one, incoherent tragedy.

He scouted the room and raced through his mind in joint favor. There were three of _those things_ standing in the room, five including the two he had been running from.

He noted the entry points in his own mind. Two broken windows and one busted door. In tandem. Was it planned? No. It didn't appear to be. Their movements are far to erratic. Puppet controlled? Potentially. That would explain their resistance to my Shadow-Control. Resistance to pain. Resistance to reason. Mind devoid of self-preservation. Singular drive is feasting. Cannablism. Augmented strength—

The two walkers he had dispatched of were slowly climbing back onto their feet.

—_and_ stamina. Must convene with survivors but first only with backup. Only logical response at this current moment:

He ran towards the spiral staircase into the upper stacks.

_Get the fuck out of here, Shikamaru!_

The monsters gave chase, barreling up the staircase with newly-found coordination. Shikamaru continued down the foyer and into the first corridor of books. The stacks loomed over his head, over five meters high and twenty meters deep. Lighting was unusually sparse and on some long days, the books appeared to sink endlessly into the distance.

_Exit by 7C. Let's go, let's go..._

He turned right, then left, and down another pathway of stacks. He grabbed several books along the way, being extra careful not to drop any in his haste. He could hear the faint echo of slobbers and growls. They were angrier, but further away and this comforting distance which was preferable to open-mouthed, teeth only kisses.

5B, 5C, 5D...

He stopped at 5E, and rested his back against several Earth Language texts.

_Relax, Shikamaru. Relax. If they are what you think __**they are**__, then you need to __**calm the fuck down**__! Fifteen second breaths, let's go._

He knew the stacks well. He had spent far too many hours in these halls, both in earnest research and in slumber. It was easy to lose one's self in these books and easier to lose others in the shadow. The stacks served as a brilliant recluse from the rest of his Decryption unit. For a high-end intelligence agency, his constituents were completely inept at navigating its hallways. Perhaps because they rarely ventured themselves, at least not as frequently as he did.

The only person he could not elude was Lady Tsuande herself. She had a knack for Hide-and-Seek. Or maybe her boobs had built in sonar, his assistant had often joked. He never dared to ask.

"Shikamaru! Get back to work, you lazy dolt!" she often yelled. She never tapped him on the shoulder, brushed his cheeks with a kiss or something. It was the same booming call from behind, followed in beat with a cross-armed frown.

He laughed and dipped his head against the shelf. That woman. That crazy fucking woman. He looked up at a torch and hoped to see her silhouette, just as he often would these past few months. She was stern, like many of the other women in his life. Like his mother, Temari, Ino, Sakura. And he would have looked to find a familiar face in this stressful moment. But all he found was the granite rooftop and shadows that's fell into the stacks, like leaves in the autumn season.

Granny Tsunade, you okay...?

Their figures loomed amidst the sparse torch lights, wizzing by like sudden gusts, never settling, never resting, with spazzes of movement and screams broken by discomforting silence. He counted the steps and rate of frequency. There were at least two of them up here with him now. The other three had probably given up or gotten lost among another floor. In these darkened corridors he could have easily abused his powers, but that option had already been exhausted.

A _lot _of options appeared to have already be exhausted.

He grabbed one of the books and hoisted it six shelves over, diagonally from where he sat. _Thud. _Almost immediately, he heard maniacal scrambles to where the book had landed. He repeated it once more, but even further and this time with two more books. _Thud thud. _The shuffles followed as well, more quickly and further than before.

They were buying it.

This is _it_. He thought.

"I'm not one for gambles..."

He brought his hands together and crossed his legs. Meeting thumb to thumb and forming a cube with the rest of his fingers, he lost himself in a trance.

"...but it's up to _you_ now."

* * *

She lay peacefully in her bed as she had been for the past two weeks, bedridden from a fight that had all but killed her. Her love for Konoha had prevailed but so did her age. She was a sixty year old woman who had spent the last twenty years in the skin of a college student. And that shell had finally burst. She was drugged tired from slews of medication and inaction. Being weak was one thing; idleness was its own depressant.

All was not torture, though.

Two loves lay at her bedside—a portrait of Dan and a full view of the village. Both appeared frozen in time, crystallized behind veneers of glass and warm sentiment. She had often wished to shake each one, like a Christmas ball, so that the images would animate and flutter in snow.

Dan loved snow, in fact, so much that he had asked for a winter photo shoot on their third year anniversary.

She recalls the day with stark clarity. The odd warmness. The booming sun. The trickling flurry. He was smiling when Tsunade took the photo. He wasn't ready for the picture, yet somehow managed to pull his gums into the biggest cheese known to Konoha.

In the warm glow of the holidays, the village was smiling, too. One mischievous child tried to photo bomb the picture, his hands waving for haughty attention. Another raised his arms diagonally, like a body-builder. Dan was in the picture, too, his face cut off by the sudden jerk of the camera.

It didn't matter though. Those were good times. The _best_, actually. It was a place Tsunade often visited in her delirium.

"_BECAUSE I CAN," _a voice from the shadows spoke.

—though the nightmares found her, too.

"Orochimaru is missing again."

"_Again_?" Tsunade peered up from her glass of sake. Jiraiya lay down his.

The two sat at across from one another in the Onjo Cafe, as they had been doing since their younger years after class. Jiraiya was privy to binges of plum wine, young women, and curses but today his words carried a grace Tsunade had rarely seen. He was cordial.

"Yeah," he said with a grin. "And _you_ were sulking. Again."

_Oh. This day, _she thought.

Her vision blurred, so much that Jiraiya's spiky hair appeared as tiny clouds in the dimly illuminated bar. She touched her eyes. They were wet. She had been crying again. In public. And hadn't realized until it was too late.

She turned to the bar to find hushed faces suddenly become lively once more. In fact the whole restaurant seemed to unfreeze themselves at her glance. She turned back to Jiraiya, who held back a worried frown.

"I'm sorry, Jiraiya, I was just—"

"No. No need to apologize." Jiraiya peered down at his shot glass. He smirked softly. "Just something in your eye. I know." Jiraiya slid his hand across the table, pushing a napkin towards her uneaten meal. "These allergies will be the death of you."

Her fiance Dan had died one month prior, in the first Ninja War, on account of a reconnaissance mission gone terribly wrong. He was with several other nin at the time, none of which knew nor attempted to administer the proper medical attention. She remembered cursing at them with every word hurled with the ferocity of shuriken, yet she felt every one missed their mark. "How could you fucking let him die!?" "Where the fuck were your med kits?!" "You're a disgrace to the entire goddamn village!"

She took the napkin from the table, briefly touching Jiraiya's hand. He pulled back immediately and for a moment, he looked more sober than he actually was.

"Thank you," she finally mustered.

"Don't mention it."

She blotted her eyes threw the napkin away from her, hitting a patron who had been seated at the bar. Even her own tears reminded her of blood. Jiraiya held back a laugh.

"About Orochimaru," she resumed. "I'm getting real worried about him."

"Don't be. He's still butt hurt over the fight with Hanzo. He'll get over it."

"Are you sure that's it?"

"If I know the guy," Jiraiya said leaning back into hair, "which I'm saying, yes, I know my best friend pretty damn well... then he's off playing with his weird germ-stuff somewhere. Working on some crazy lab nonsense until he gets bored and crawls back out of whatever funk he's in."

"If you're so close to him, why don't you talk to him."

Jiraiya crossed his arms briskly, like a child. "No. You do it."

"I did it last time."

"Because you two are both science geeks. Relieve me of your nerd-speak."

Tsunade rolled her eyes.

"_Excuse_ me...?"

Jiraiya sighed. "He's probably still mad at me for calling him a little booger."

"Just man up and do it."

"You make it sound _easy_."

"You just said you're his best friend."

"Yeah, doesn't mean I can talk sense into that guy. He has an ego the size of Mount Hokage. No way he'll listen to me."

"Fine, we'll both confront him."

"Agreed," Jiraiya said with a grin. "Just leave me out of it."

Tsunade glared at Jiraiya who in turn avoided her eyes completely. They were like this since their days at the Gennin academy, bickering until one finally submitted (which rarely happened). Old Man Sarutobi had to constantly break them up or mediate some terms of peace.

Jiraiya downed the rest of his glass and raised his arm into the air. "Oh Miss! Another refill, please." The waitress giggled and skipped away. Jiraiya's eyes were glued at her backside until she disappeared into the kitchen.

"For a grown man, you act like a five-year old."

"Takes one to know one," Jiraiya muttered.

Tsunade cracked a smile. Jiraiya's brutishness had a ignorant charm to it.

"Fine. I'll talk to him. Where is he this time?"

Jiraiya tapped his forehead. "Hey now, I was just kidding. You don't have to do this so soon..."

Tsunade felt her temper simmer once more. "So soon, what...?"

Jiraiya remained silent. His eyes searched for the proper words. Tsunade asked once more, leaning into the space between them.

"Just tell me where he is. I'll get him back," she said with a smirk. "I could use a break from these allergies."

Jiraiya touched his chin with his thumb, feigning deep thought. "He's... well, how do I put this?" He paused then rose a pointed finger to the space above him. Tsunade frowned.

"Upstairs...?"

Jiraiya shook his head and brought his hand higher. Tsunade winced.

"Up north?"

Jiraiya smiled, then raised his fingers a bit higher. "_Way_ up north," he continued. "Also, you might want to get that napkin back. I kind of drew a map on it."

Tsunade slid out of her booth chair with a scoff and quickly snagged the discarded sheet. She looked at it and laughed. There was indeed a map, and her tears had smeared the lines, making them all nearly illegible.

"You know what, Jiraiya?" she said, looking upwards.

"What?" he asked, his voice nasally from a pinky that was scouring his nose for snot. Tsunade could only smile at his brashness.

"Nevermind."

Suddenly, she stood in what felt like a tundra, winds blasting her with freezing snow and bits of hale. It was painful though nothing she had seen in survival training. She pulled her cloak closer to her body and sped up her breathing.

"Nothing a great ninja of the Senju clan can't handle…" she thought. "...but another layer wouldn't hurt." She removed her hands from her pocket and pulled a pair wool gloves from her battle vest.

_My hands_—

She looked at her hands, unwrinkled, uncoated with skin-changing chakra. They were the hands of a real twenty-six year old. She touched her face. Her face, too, was smooth. She unsheathed her kunai and observed her reflection in the mirror. Clean lines. Full, blonde hair. _Youth_.

And, of course, sleep-drained eyes.

Tsunade found the clearing on her map and looked for the next marker: a large gaping tree with an "X" formation in the middle of a sinking meadow.

Orochimaru had a preference for creepy things, a trait he had carried all throughout their teen years. He seemed normal enough as a little Genin, an earnest, quiet intellectual that excelled at everything his mind could touch. But somehow a superiority complex formed that snowballed into something darker, an insatiable hunger for self-improvement. _Entitlement_. She could never quite warm up nor understand Orochimaru the way she did Jiraiya because Orochimaru never sought to be friendly _nor_ understood.

His most common desire was to be let alone.

_Feared, _even.

She tread slowly towards the wooden tower, marking for trip wires and other traps. Orochimaru had developed a sadistic sense of humor that worsened with each hiatus.

Somewhere deep in the snow, Tsunade felt a slight pressure against her shin. _There, _she realized_._ She scouted the field for oncoming threats. Behind a boulder, emerged a plank that glimmered in the light.

Tasteful, she thought.

She dodged the array of kunai with a quick dive roll and landed several meters from where she had leapt. From a distance, she heard a _click _go off_._ She surveyed the area once more but found nothing. _Left_? _Right_? No.

Up!

Looking up, she found a kunai that sped quickly towards her path. _No. _A kunai with an _explosive tag_!

Tsunade back sprung a safe distance. She watched as the kunai planted into the ground and began its fuse sequence. _Just a few seconds until it gives! _Surging forth a quick ounce of chakra, she punched the ground before her, wedging a massive slab of earth between her and the improvised ballistic. She waited for an explosion but an explosion never came.

Instead, the tag fizzed out a plume of smoke. The smoke continued to chute until it eventually formed an image.

A middle finger.

"Tea?"

"No thanks."

"Good, because I finished it already." Orochimaru smirked at his own remark. Tsunade smirked back.

_You're an asshole, you know that Orochimaru? _That's what she wanted to bite back with but her face said enough.

She had wrapped herself in a blanket Orochimaru had given her but had begun to harbor doubts. It reeked of polyurethane as if it had been used to wipe down a dead frog or something much slimier. She knew the odor well. She thought about tossing the rag aside, but hesitated. It was the only barrier that stood between her and frostbite.

Orochimaru sat at the other end of the lab, his front to Tsunade, tinkering with an unseen spectacle. He was immersed, like a scientist that had lost touch with the world beyond his obsessions. That was what bothered Tsunade. Because that's how he had _always _looked.

"That wasn't funny, Orochi-kun."

He chuckled. Or rather, _hissed. _"What? The tea joke?"

Tsunade snickered. "No, the goddamn booby trapping. You knew we were coming to look for you."

"And you knew I didn't want to be found."

"And yet you leave us a map and lace the endpoint with vulgar booby traps?"

"There's no fun without a sense of risk."

Tsunade felt the urge to punch him square on the nose but restrained herself. Orochimaru was always abrasive in his words, even moreso around those with whom he was comfortable. This was his way of displaying affection, as toxic as it was. He had always been less of a snake and more like a porcupine when it came to friendship.

Tsunade peeked out from the blanket, enough to ensure her words not be muffled. "That's the thing Orochimaru. This isn't fun. You're our friend. Stop doing this. Stop running off and doing god knows what. We have a village that needs repairing."

"But you know what I'm doing," he immediately answered. "If you have a problem with me finding ways to not die next time, are you sure the problem here is me? The politics of the ninja world will negotiate itself. The village will rise once more." His gaze disappeared beneath a cluster of messy hair. "But power will not find the lazy. Power must be sought. Siezed."

It was easy to argue with Jiraiya; his arguments were passionate and logically one directional. But Orochimaru was sharper with his words. There was a weight to them that made most Jonin instructors look like children. She collected her statements and took a deep breath.

"You know we almost beat him, right?"

Orochimaru paused, then continued working. "Hanzo?"

Orochimaru chuckled. "You think I'm concerned about a bragging rights? Is that what Jiraiya has led you to believe?"

"Is it?"

"Yeah. It wasn't a losing battle. It was a stalemate."

Tsunade sighed, huffing a cloud of mist that seemed to fill the whole room in its temperance. She observed as it billowed from the table and unto Orochimaru's still, intense face. It was at least -10 ° C down here, she noted. Yet there he was, garbed in one layer of lab coat and breathing steadily, as if hyperthermia were a passing chill to his skin and his _heart_, though she oft questioned if he truly had the latter.

Tsunade cupped her hands and breathed hot air as deeply as she could into them.

"Orochi-kun, I'm not here to argue with you. We just want you to—"

"My condolence," he said with a snap. Their eyes met briefly and for a moment she saw something sincere stirring amidst his pupils. He dropped his gaze before she could figure out what. "I imagine it must have been difficult."

Orochimaru resumed his work, switching from forceps to a thermometer and then finally a scalpel.

Tsunade hesitated, then forced a laugh.

"I don't need your apologies for the traps."

"I wasn't referring to the traps," he said with a scoff.

Tsunade allowed a smile to slip into her lips, one that disappeared as quickly as it had formed. She was in an odd place of gratitude and impatience.

"Orochi-kun. Why weren't you at the funeral? You and Dan were friends, he would have wanted you to be there."

"You have me misjudged," Orochimaru interrupted. "I was indeed present for the man's sending. I just chose not to walk." Orochimaru looked closely at a sample, then scribbled hastily into a notebook. "Besides, you speak as though the dead hold contempt for those who forget them. The dead know nothing but a new plane of existence. These burial rituals are ceremonies to comfort the living." He chuckled underneath his words. "Unless you believe in that god thing then we can just stop being scientists now and more like old witches."

There were harsh truths in his words, and they cut as sharply as any chakra blade ever could. She grasped the necklace she had given Dan, the same she had given to Nawaki, the same Grandpa Hashirama had given to her. It had kept her warm on colder nights, or at least she could have sworn it did. It was a sentiment that challenged her understanding of human anatomy.

And she would have preferred to keep it that way.

Tsunade watched Orochimaru continue to work, choosing to bare the words then reflect them. She tilted her head, attempting to steal a look.

"So then... what have you been doing? Since then?"

"See for yourself," Orochimaru responded. "I must warn you though: there will be a little red."

Tsunade's shoulders tensed up. The image of blood renewed painful images, enough to nauseate her. Orochimaru slowly pushed aside various beakers and flasks, clearing a view for Tsunade to observe.

"Hurry, you're missing the show."

Tsunade willed herself from the shaking and walked over the operating table. The cold brushed at her with steel bristles. Orochimaru quickly walked over to a nearby shelf and pulled from its contents a magnifying glass.

"You might need this."

Tsunade grabbed the lens and Orochimaru then continued tinkering. She checked the lens for signs of booby trapping or poison. Orochimaru sighed.

"Do you distrust me that mu—"

"Yes," Tsunade interrupted.

She put her eye to the lens and observed under Orochimaru's hands a rat in a glass dome. Tsunade watched as Orochimaru proceeded to grab a bottle and a syringe. The label on the bottle was messy and yellow but after a long squint, she made out the words "sodium thiopental. "

"You're sedating it?"

"No. Killing it."

She slid the glass from her eye.

"Why?"

"For what else. Science."

Orochimaru injected the clear liquid into the rat. He spoke while working, ignoring her. "This recent war has inspired me so." The rat began to convulse until its shakes ceased entirely.

"Orochimaru, what are you—"

"You know the body does not completely die when a heart has expired, correct? What if I told you one might restore a dead creature completely?"

"Like what? You mean like..."

Orochimaru smiled. "Reanimation."

Her eyes met with Orochimaru's. "Reanimation? What the hell are you talking about?"

"Why do I have to explain what you already know?"

Tsunade watched as Orochimaru calmly lay down the syringe and picked up a contraption which on its front displayed a dial. He wound up the circular knob and sat back in his chair. His movements were nonchalant. _Cold_. The dial slowly ticked, counting down seconds that felt like seismic tremors.

Tsunade stood from her chair. "Only the Second Hokage could perform such a technique and even _he_ questioned the morality of it! "

"Since when did our worlds have morals, Lady Tsunade?" For the first time since she had arrived, Orochimaru eyes simmered into a glare. It was as though he were a snake, posturing to snap.

"Since the technique was banned. Since... the Second Great War." Tsunade reached her hands out, as if to seize some semblance of sanity. "What you're doing is... illegal! This is criminal!"

Orochimaru lay down his hands. The room fell silent, tempered by the hiss of Bunsen burners. The frog lay motionless still, droplets of moisture seeping from the needle entry. His glare lingered on Tsunade as did Tsunade's glare on him. "You say war as if the word justifies its own atrocities. We are _scientists_, my dear. Puppet masters in a world that celebrates espionage and murder."

"But death... you cannot toy with death. When someone dies... that is it! They're gone!" The words burned her own throat.

Orochimaru laughed. "Think of how the great puppet masters of the sand tribe manipulated corpses for purposes of weaponry. How the Second Hokage reanimated legendary ninjas to defend Konoha's flag. How survivors of the Mist slaughter hid under piles of rotted bodies to avoid detection. We manipulate the Dead everyday to protect the living! And you say I am at fault?!"

"But the technique... the science is forbidden! War and the defense of loved ones is its own justification!" She slammed her hands against the wall, rattling the room. Spots of rubble trickled from the ceiling. "You lost _**no one**_ in the last great war, nor do you intend to use this in the name of Konoha! What you're doing is for your own selfish desires!"

"How little you know, woman," he said, with a grave tone that made Tsunade begin to tear.

"I don't believe it. You can't bring back someone from another plane. Even the Second's technique was incomplete. What about... the central nervous system? The brain!? The heart!? What of memories?"

Orochimaru's eyes switched from the rat to Holter monitor. When he brought them back to Tsunade, they were golden, and snake-like.

"What about them."

Tsunade felt the moisture trail down her face. "You're heartless," she struck back.

"And you're naive," he replied without looking.

The clock ticked and ticked, Orochimaru shifting his attention from the lifeless rat and the clock. The syringe oozed its yellow fluid at the tip staining the drip point below it. Tsunade hands shook. His hands sped furiously through different motion, too quickly for her to make out. Nor could she, for the room was spinning faster than the storm had been whirling outside of the laboratories.

She shifted her eyes to the tanks that lined the back of the room. They were not merely fluid contained but incubators that housed variety of different specimens, each unmoving. But for how long?

Orochimaru looked up briefly then back at Tsunade.

"Why are you doing this, Orochi-kun?" she mustered.

He turned to her and spoke tersely. "Because I can."

Tsunade threw the blanket aside and headed for the door. Orochimaru continued speaking.

"There is a land of the Living and a land of the Dead, Tsunade-chan. I wish to be their Bridge."

She ran out and the cold struck her immediately. As if someone had shaken her peaceful little globe, her world was flittering with snow. Her friend was turning into a demon, or had been a demon all along. She had seen that ravenous gaze before, on the warfront in the eyes of men who stood atop piles of bodies and now it was worn in the eyes of her once dearest companion.

She stumbled over and breathed in a handful of snow. She gasped for air, forcing vomit that would not materialize. She stood on her feet and screamed into the trees.

She had dreamt of Dan returning one day, felt the warmness of his lips and a pulse that kissed her fingertips. Of a day filled with more pictures and snowballs and kids. Suddenly that image was rocked and the glass ball was shaking and images were swirling too fast for her to hold onto.

Nawaki was gone. Dan was gone. Forever. Nothing could bring them back. Death was the endpoint, she thought. It needed to be the endpoint!

...right?

A million miles away, back in the comfort of her own bed, gravity gave in and shattered the window overlooking Konoha. It was chaotic and oddly quiet, like a snow globe that weathered its own storm. Tusnade opened her eyes and found a shadowy figure before her.

"You... why... why are you here..." her throat struggled to utter.

But the figure did not speak. It merely stood on the pane, biding its own presence. Finally, it began to stir. The figured lowered itself into the room, crushing the fractured chunks of glass beneath it.

And everything went black.


End file.
